


Til' Kingdom Comes

by wanderlustt



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Dimitri and Claude both survive, F/M, Fingering, Golden Deer Route, Love Triangles, Slow Burn, Vaginal Sex, but plus Dimitri, romantic sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-01-04 02:17:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21189929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderlustt/pseuds/wanderlustt
Summary: On the cusp of Claude’s proposal, Byleth loses her memory.





	1. snapdragon

**Author's Note:**

> I've watched too many Korean dramas this week and I couldn't get this idea out of my head. Though I'm sure the whole "memory loss" thing has been done, I thought it'd be fun to try my hand at it anyway, but with a spin! (Dima will show up in chapter two, ofc.) Thanks for reading and have a nice day. :)

It begins when Byleth forgets Claude’s birthday. 

He thinks nothing of it at first -- they're in the midst of battle, after all, and there's little time to be wasted on disposable traditions when every minute is a commodity. For the record, he _gets_ it. Don't spare the effort if there's no telling what tomorrow may bring, if tomorrow even comes. There's war to end, dark secrets to unearth, and finding a trivial birthday gift is nothing more but a petty and unaffordable luxury amidst chaos, bloodshed, and violence. Not to mention, they have preparations to make, strategies to consider, and most daunting of all, plans for the future…

Yes, the future.

Claude fiddles with the ring his father gave him and wonders.

Even after practicing his proposal seventeen times, it still doesn’t feel...right. The words feel sticky and coarse in his mouth, and leaves a weird aftertaste, like he's garbled a bucket of wine grapes only to spit them out before they can make the actual good stuff they drink at supper. He decides to enlist the help of his two most trusted advisors, (or: rather, the only two people who happened to be available in the dining hall) and realizes his worst fears have come true when Hilda sweetly suggests that Byleth would "appreciate the thought" while Lorenz is far less subtle, saying it was "unconvincing at best."

Maybe proposal isn't an apt word to describe what he's doing. _Favor _is more like it. Claude knows he's asking for the world and more; and bless Byleth, but he's not sure when that saintly patience of hers will run out. After all, he's asking her to stay, to mind Fodlan, to be his silent guardian while he takes care of business in Almyra. He’s asking her to marry him, to spend his life with him, to grow old with him, but wait for his return -- god knows when that’ll be.

But back to the birthday.

The first year they’d met, Byleth had scrounged up a bouquet of snapdragons from the greenhouse to gift him. When he told her that snapdragons were symbols of deceit, she gaped in utter mortification and apologized until the word _sorry_ sounded like some foreign language he’d never heard before. He’d laughed it off and for what it was worth, she laughed too. The flower quickly became something of an inside joke between them that no one else understood; and every year since, she’d gifted him a single snapdragon for his birthday.

Every year, well, except this year.

Claude decides to cut her some slack. Never mind that now. Tomorrow is a new day and there are bigger things on his mind.

If they outlive Nemesis, they'll end the war, which means he’s going to ask her to marry him.

He’s nervous. For more than one reason.

**

His second inkling that something may be off is when Byleth drops her blade on the battlefield.

Byleth never drops her blade. "Never drop your weapon," she had told them on their first day of school. In fact, she had bludgeoned their class with this sentiment so much that it had turned into somewhat of a running gag between members of the Golden Deer. _Die before you drop your blade, _they had laughed, _or else the professor will kill you first_; and yet, despite their misgivings, the lesson ran its course and did the trick until their weapons became all but an extension of themselves. No member of the Golden Deer dropped a single blade, a single spear, or a single bow. And so far, they had kept their lives because of it.

But Byleth drops her blade and Claude knows something is wrong.

Luckily, Nemesis is dead at her feet and the remaining fragments of his forces have taken off towards the ruins. There's no telling where they plan on hiding, but it doesn't matter because it's over. A new dawn has settled over Fodlan. They've won; and all those years of bloodshed and violence have finally seen reparations. _We've won_, he thinks, and when he looks at his classmates -- his most loyal comrades -- pick themselves up from the ruins of battle, he feels hopeful for the first time in years.

Even injured, Claude musters the strength to pick himself up. As his gaze settles on Byleth, he begins to pick up the pace until he breaks into a cold run.

_It’s over_, he wants to tell her, _it’s finally over._

But when she turns to look at him, her eyes are lost. "Where am I?"

Claude finds himself slowing to a halt.

"What am I doing here?"

He hesitates, but takes a step forward, only for her to take a step back in response. This must be bad timing, he tells himself, as his face breaks wide into a smile. Byleth should know better than to have an existential crisis in the middle of war. "Not the greatest time to crack a joke, my friend." But she doesn't look like she hears him -- in fact, it seems like there's a loop in her mind that's been stretched so taut that it splits into two when she finally looks up to meet his gaze.

“Claude?" Only in retrospect does he know her voice has become an echo withered away in the winds of change. "Where's Dimitri?"

**

When they return to Garreg Mach, Byleth is inconsolable.

She locks herself in her room and doesn’t leave for a whole day.

Each one of the Golden Deer try their best to lure her out.

Raphael invites her to lift weights at the training grounds. Ignatz offers her to take the first look at his class portrait (he’s not even close to being finished, but Hilda insists he do it for her sake). Marianne willows outside Byleth’s door, not saying much at all. Lorenz invites her to tea (he allegedly has a special batch shipped in from Brigid). Lysithea goads her freshly baked angelcakes. Hilda, who’s watched every Golden Deer failure with morbid fascination, prods her to get some fresh air. Sylvain, ever the opportunist, who’d somehow weaseled himself into their ranks, offers to take her out to dinner and a show. (She ignores him.)

Byleth answers the same every time.

_Please, just leave me_.

Claude is the last to try.

He knocks twice and waits for an answer that doesn’t come. When the silence stretches too long, he clears his throat and says, “It’s me.”

Much to his surprise, the door cracks open.

He wedges his foot in the opening before she can change her mind but he finds that he can open it with ease. When he walks in, he finds her sitting silently on her sleeping bed. She hasn’t changed, hasn’t moved a muscle – he doesn’t know _why_ he expects her to look different – and for a moment, he’s convinced things can go back to normal. With the ring in his pocket, he thinks he might just get lucky today.

But he knows he can't ignore what he's seen. He feels a wedge in his chest, but tries his best to prod her in the right direction. “Byleth…what happened out there?”

She doesn’t waver; she just stares into an empty void that he can never reach. Like an insolent child, she tucks her knees to her chest and glowers.

He pauses, running his finger against the smooth edge of the wedding band. “Do you...remember?"

“_I remember_,” she says with all the self-assurance of a religious zealot. “He was with me. He was…” 

It takes him a moment to realize she's talking about Dimitri.

“Byleth, he’s missing.”

She sounds like an echo lost in the wind. “Missing?"

He’s not sure how to break the news, especially when it’s old news she should already know. She was there when they found out three months ago that Dimitri had vanished after the Battle of Gronder Field. There had been no sightings of him and he had been presumed dead ever since. But before he can offload all this information, he tries to rein it back. He doesn’t know why he's feeling so petty and jealous over a dead man.

After all, they just ended a war. They should be celebrating, drinking, laughing, and feasting…and…

He takes a seat next to her on the mattress. “How much do you remember?"

She shifts away from him, the space between them stretching too long to be intimate. “I…just told you. I remember everything."

He has a sinking feeling in his gut: he knows what this means, but still, he has to find the strength to ask. “But you don't remember..." He finds it hard to finish his thought. _Us_, he wants to say, but from that look of utter contempt on her face, he decides it's not the right moment. "You don't remember anything in between." And his strength escapes him when he musters out the next few words: "Nothing about the war."

Byleth pauses. "No," she says, lowering her gaze. “Last I know, I was with Dimitri. We'd killed Edelguard, we...we'd just liberated the kingdom.” Her voice becomes so delicate he can hardly hear her. “We were...we were..." Only silence follows in her wake.

He tucks the wedding ring away and puts on the best smile he can manage. "We'll figure it out, Byleth. Don't worry."

He's not sure if he's lying for his sake or hers.

**

“If you love someone, you should let them go.” 

Claude resists the urge to sigh as he rounds the corner of the dining hall. “You know I always appreciate your input, Sylvain.”

Through and through, a son of Gautier. Sylvain doesn’t let up and follows Claude up the stairs and into the library, where the candlelight glimmers against the walls of the study. “That’s what you told me during our academy days. Remember?”

“I’m afraid that memory has eluded me.”

It’s a lie. Claude never forgets anything.

Sylvain’s talking about one of his many, _many_ romantic pursuits, probably the baker's girl. He’d been particularly distressed after she broke up with him on a whim and Claude had dispensed some petty wisdom to get him to move on. _If you love her, let her go_. Some inconsequential, _cliché_, trite piece of bullshit to get him to shut up. But just because something was cliché didn’t make it any less true, and he had tacked that on too at the time, much to Sylvain's chagrin. Oh, how the tables, well, turn.

“Seems like you should take a helpful dose of your own advice, eh?”

Claude puts on a thousand-watt smile as he plucks out one of the many tomes on the shelves. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about Lord Gautier.”

The title gets Sylvain to grimace as he finds a comfortable spot by the shelf to lean on. “No need to act coy. We all know you were going to propose.”

He tries to sound as disinterested as possible, flipping through the pages until he gets where he wants. “Oh yeah? Did you now?”

Sylvain clucks, his tongue popping off the roof of his mouth. “Indeed. Talk about bad timing.”

He’s not wrong, but Claude doesn’t mind the negging in the least. No one can criticize him as much as himself. “So word got out.” He smiles with the graciousness of a saint, even as his eyes scan the page underneath his fingertips. “Well, even the best of plans go awry.”

But Sylvain doesn’t lower his gaze, instead, nodding in affirmation. “Yeah. I wouldn't worry about it, either. Truth is, she probably hit her head too hard when we weren't looking. Wouldn’t put it past her. Sometimes I feel like even she doesn’t know her own limits.”

Claude arches a brow. “Is this your way of comforting me?” 

“Ha! Funny.” Sylvain scratches his neck. “Is it working?”

There it is.

"_Hm_. According to the great medic Sir Dunwell of Rivendale, memory loss is a temporary ailment." Claude closes the book with a snap. "Perhaps you _have_ done me a great favor, Sylvain. Somehow, I feel better already."

**

The war is over; it's time to go back home.

Lorenz leaves yesterday, Ignatz and Raphael leave this morning, Lysithea will leave in days to come, and the only ones left at Garreg Mach are Claude, Hilda, Marianne, and Byleth, the latter still holed up in her sleeping room.

Claude fiddles with the ring in his pocket again and wonders.

He loves her, he wants to marry her, he wants to be with her. But he can’t leave her, not like this.

So he decides he's going to ask her to come with him to Almyra. They’ll have to establish a baseline of trust, of course, and there are definitely some provisions he’ll have to take with him to secure her safety. But he can deal with all the hassle once they set sail. Seteth can probably serve as a decent interim leader and Claude is almost too sure he won't pass on the opportunity, not while Rhea is out of commission and Byleth is, well...

It's just memory loss, right? And memory loss is temporary.

Problem is, Byleth claims she remembers everything; in fact, she has memories she's never experienced; and though Claude is no worry wart, there's only two proper explanations that make sense: she's completely and utterly delusional, or...she's telling the truth.

The ring catches cloth and he has a hard time getting it loose.

It occurs to him only then that Byleth could easily rebuff him. She doesn't know him, not anymore. She doesn't know their inside jokes. She doesn't know that they've shared a bed. She doesn't know their history. She doesn't know she's in love with him, though that likely means she's simply _not_ in love with him at all. Because despite it all, Byleth believes every word she says, even if they're impossibilities.

"Maybe that's the problem," he mutters quietly.

From downfield comes Hilda and Marianne, carrying with them a letter from a carrier pigeon. They’re running – _Hilda_ is running – which means the news must be urgent. When they finally make it up the hill where he is, though, Marianne is the first to speak.

“They’ve found Dimitri.”

For the first time, Claude closes his eyes and prays.


	2. scar

Byleth blinks.

She has cuts on her hands she doesn’t recognize. Some are old wounds of a time past – cream-colored and thawed, nothing more than a ridge left on skin – while others are fresh, blistered and sore from the wears of gripping her sword handle. She studies the roadmap of lesions as if exploring a new expanse of unearthed treasures from a land far away, her fingers tracing each and every crinkle, wondering what kind of memory lies hidden away.

What concerns her the most, of course, is the one scar that’s missing.

A scar that should be sitting right between her thumb and forefinger.

* * *

When Byleth coerces Dimitri to try his hand at cooking, she thinks it a good method to foster a sense of normality at Garreg Mach: cooking, cleaning, and taking care to mind the stable horses offers a sense of purpose away from the battlefield and she thinks – perhaps it’s wishful and silly – that if she just shows him there’s more to life than war, he’ll learn to forgive himself just a little more every day. And after a notable period of silence and mourning, he eventually acquiesces.

Yet, in Byleth’s scramble to dress the table with the proper ingredients and cutlery, she had stupidly dropped her cutting knife.

She, of course, had stupidly tried to catch the knife before it could hit the ground.

“Professor!”

Dimitri arrives just in time to see her spill blood on the floor.

* * *

Byleth learns early on in life that peace is hard to come by in her line of work.

Being a mercenary often means restless days on end touring the road; and being a professor at Garreg Mach comes with its own set of burdens: she had a whole new set of responsibilities to care for -- students that live or die on her watch.

Nowadays, there’s no time to be careless, not while they’re in the middle of war, but for what it’s worth, she learns to recognize these moments of peace and quiet, to relish them, even in their small and unobtrusive moments.

Right now is one of them.

Dimitri’s face is utterly strained as a bead of sweat rolls from the recesses of his hairline to his chin. “Professor, you ought to take more care.” His hands are careful, fingers flexed, as he bandages the open gash sitting between her thumb and forefinger: one wrap to tie the bleeding, two to soak the blood, and three for good measure. “I’m afraid this is the best I can do.”

Byleth watches that look of concentration on his face and wonders.

Dimitri makes sure every loose end is tucked in before looking up to meet her gaze. “Professor? Is there something on my face?"

“No. Why?"

“You’re, um…you’re staring.”

A blush kisses her cheeks. “Sorry.” Had she been so obvious?

Byleth feels a warm glow in her stomach when he lowers her hand to her thigh, his fingers lingering a moment too long to be accidental; it takes her a moment to change the subject to something more forthcoming. “I can ask Mercedes to take a look when she’s back from her supply run.” But she doesn’t make the first move to pull away, even as he continues to study her face. “Thank you, Dimitri.”

Still, he frowns. “You offer your thanks even though I’ve done you a great disservice. There’s no doubt in my mind this cut will leave a scar.” His thumb grazes her hand gently, and in a single moment of lucidity, Byleth can’t help but wonder if his touch has wavered too long to be simply friendly. “It seems I can’t escape my clumsiness even outside the battlefield.”

“I adore you—” Byleth knits her brows and the words crumble lamely in her mouth. "I adore your clumsiness, I mean.” A pause, as she scrambles to find the proper words to remediate her stupid faux paus: “It’s endearing.”

And then, despite herself, she wilts. “I didn’t mean…” At this point, her voice betrays her.

A blush kisses Dimitri’s cheeks and he lets go of her hands, leaving them cold where his touch should’ve been. “I see.” He doesn’t say much, and Byleth’s eyes immediately sting with the salt of humiliation.

They sit in silence and trepidation and Dimitri’s apprehension makes her stomach flutter.

Peace is short, she tells herself, and this exchange might be their last if they’re not careful. Tomorrow comes with no certainty – that’s perhaps the only thing she knows to be true. As they trek through this path together, they’ll inevitably meet Edelguard, and things will come to a conclusion, for better or worse. There’s no time to quell the truth, no matter how small and inconsequential they are, and the thought of staying silent for even a moment longer leaves a bitter aftertaste in her mouth.

Stone-faced and still, Byleth meets his gaze. “Actually, that’s exactly what I meant.”

Dimitri’s eyes widen. “Professor?”

She doesn’t waver, just looks at him and smiles. “I adore you.” And then. “I always have.” Trembling, her bandaged fingers reach for the lapels of his fur coat, an oddly domestic deed given the circumstances. “Always will.”

Dimitri’s fingers flit their way to her legs, digging gently into her thighs -- his touch is dizzying, sending shocks of delirium and excitement up her spine; his face is so red she’s almost sure he’s going to burst.

Instead, his lips crash onto hers and they’re kissing – he’s a little rough, a little sloppy, a little careless, and a little clumsy, but she quickly realizes she likes it in spite of herself. “Adore you,” he murmurs, his fingers tender as they reach up to brush her cheek; he coerces her into another kiss, chaste and soft, and she quickly realizes that the second time is just as novel as the first. “Always.”

He presses his forehead against hers; and another moment of silence passes between them as he brushes a lock of hair away from her face.

As he presses closer and closer, she feels yet another flutter in her stomach – something warm, and something comforting – and he moves to cup her face. “Marry me.”

Byleth blinks.

Dimitri looks deep into her eyes and smiles. “When this is all over, I want to walk a new path with you. I…want to do this right.” And then: “I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”

Her eyes sting with tears and though she’s quiet, she offers him an answer he already knows to be true.

_Yes_.

* * *

Talk to any soldier on the battlefield and they’ll tell you the same thing.

They became soldiers because of duty, because of honor, because of queens, kings, and country. Rarely do they talk about the rush of combat, the thrill of making the first cut, and the high of living to see another day. Once you’re embedded in battle, there’s nothing dreamy about it at all – it’s just survival, desperation, and counting your prayers before they betray you in the very same breath.

So peace becomes a fleeting and ephemeral luxury.

Byleth learns to identify them before they vanish, even if it’s in the comfort of some shoddy kitchen with an open gash on her hand.

As she wipes away a bead of sweat from her forehead and stares at what’s left of Edelguard – a crumpled ragdoll left in the shadows of an empire that never was – she allows herself the luxury of a smile. “It’s over,” she says, and her voice is nothing more than a whisper swept away in the final chapters of this story. _It’s over_, she thinks, the reality settling faster than the realization. _It’s finally over_.

She’s looking at Dimitri—

Until she isn’t.

Byleth blinks.

She's staring at the at the plains of a field she doesn’t recognize, staring down at a pair of hands she doesn’t recognize, staring at a man before her she doesn’t recognize.

“Claude?”

* * *

This is a life she was never meant to know.

* * *

Byleth shouldn’t be here.

No, she really shouldn’t be here.

At first, she thinks she must be living in some fever dream. There must me a multitude of explanations that fit the bill: she hit her head too hard, passed out, and in reality, she’s asleep in one of the many firelit rooms of Faerghus.

But when she wakes up the next day in a bed she doesn’t recognize, with those same hands that don’t belong to her, she knows almost instinctively that this is no dream: this is a living nightmare.

It begins to dawn on her that this must be penitence for playing with the hands of time.

That time she went back to rescue Felix from the clutches of a stubborn mage who had a hidden sleeve of spells hiding after his death knell? That time she went back to warn Ingrid about the archers hidden away in the shadows of the ruins? That time she went back to save Ashe from offering mercy to an assassin disguised as a beggar?

This is -- she knows -- the consequence of living life of free do-overs.

So for some time, Byleth considers killing herself.

Surely, if she ends her life, she’ll awaken back in the world she knows.

That must be how it works, right?

(Except she doesn’t know.)

For the first time in years, Byleth has no answers.

Worst of all, she has no idea what to do.

When she approaches Claude in the thick of night - hidden away in one of the spires of Garreg Mach - she sees his face light up with hope at the sight of her. "There's something you should know," she tells him, softly. "Will you hear me out?"

* * *

Byleth tells him the truth.

For once, Claude has nothing to say.

* * *

A knock comes at her door. “It’s me.” Claude’s voice: slow, mellow, and somewhat comforting. Though he’s still no more than an acquaintance to her, he provides a sense of familiarity: even from their academy days, they had shared their philosophies about the new world they’d foster, and though they had been pipe dreams at the time, they had turned into something Byleth learned to cling to.

Still, she had chosen Dimitri because she saw something in him -- something tired, desperate, and needing. Byleth always knew Claude would always be fine without her, but she could never say the same for Dimitri.

She clears her throat. “Come in.” Still wary, she stays seated at her writing desk as the door opens.

Claude looks every penny’s worth, dressed in his traveling robes. “Hey, listen. There’s news you should know.” He closes the door behind him with a soft click and takes a seat on her cot. Her eyes narrow – she’s not sure why he’s acting so intimate, why he’s so quick to presume a bond of friendship with her, and he quickly picks up on her discomfort because he immediately stands back up. “Sorry about that.” He pauses; he seems to be doing a lot of that, as he rummages his brain for the proper words to say. “How are you feeling?”

At once, Byleth feels guilty, though that belies a veil of frustration too. “It’s fine,” she says, utterly expressionless as she shifts her gaze to the piece of parchment hanging loose between his fingers. “You said there was news?”

Claude is quiet, as if ascertaining the space between them to make sure there are no booby traps. “They’ve found Dimitri. He’s in pretty bad condition, but he’s alive.”

She feels her breath hitch. “Where?”

“A mile downstream from Gronder.” He fiddles with the message between his fingers, rolling it up and unfurling it like he’s playing some game only he understands. “According to the kingdom lords I wrote, they plan on hosting him at House Fraldarius under guest rite. Seems like Felix survived the war long enough to keep defense of his lands from traveling sellswords and mercenaries.”

Byleth knows what she must do next as the gears begin to tick away in her mind: she needs to find him. “I see.” She doesn’t quite know how she’ll get there, but she’ll figure out the extraneous details on the way.

“Listen… I'm still having trouble understanding what's going on. Believe me when I say I've tried.” Claude interjects, scratching the back of his neck. “But we’re running short on time and there’s something you need to hear.”

Still, Byleth finds it hard to look his way without wilting. Her eyes stay glued to the piece of parchment underneath her fingertips. “Yes?”

“You and I were together,” he says, his eyes stern and utterly bereaved of any joy. “I made plans of proposing after the war was over. Well, that was until…this. I know you say you didn’t lose your memories -- that you remember everything -- but the fact of the matter is, you don’t remember what happened.”

Byleth’s face contorts, as she tries to imagine an alternate reality in which this was all truth: but she doesn’t have to imagine because he betrays no signs of lying. They _were_ together, and he _did_ have plans of proposing. “We were…together?”

Claude’s face softens. “Yeah. We were.”

She tries to imagine what it’d be like to kiss him, but the thought makes her heart wrench in pain.

It’s only then that she recognizes the shadows under his eyes; how many sleepless nights has he endured? She’ll never know. “Come to Almyra with me,” he says. “I’ll have Seteth stake his claim as interim leader and you’d…you’d love it there. It’s warm, there are markets that run miles long, and you’d love the palace. I have business to take care of there and we can…wait until this is fixed. Until your real memories return.”

“There’s nothing to fix.” Byleth narrows her gaze. “I’m not broken.”

“Byleth, I don’t know what you remember but…this isn’t the Dimitri you think you know."

She’s firm. “I don’t care.” A pause. _I need to see it for myself_, but she buries these words inside her.

He looks hurt, his face contorting for less than a split second before he breaks into a smile – a smile, of course, that betrays a wealth of agony and uncertainty. “Right.” He pats his thigh, nodding, as if to ascertain the reality of his situation now. “Well, it was worth a shot.”

Byleth will never know but she’s broken Claude’s heart. “Listen…I can’t give you what you want right now. I’m sorry.”

“I know.” He wrinkles his brows, but that smile never fails him. “I’ll see you soon.”

It’s a promise he’ll never keep.

Without thinking, he approaches her and leaves one kiss on her forehead. She doesn’t stop him, and she has a moment so profound and knowing that she nearly convinces herself that this is the norm, that this is her reality.

“Be well, my friend.”

* * *

Byleth packs herself the essentials: drybread, oil for her blade, and of course, her sword. She figures she can make it to House Frauldarius in three days on horseback, two if she uses her breaks sparingly. With the number of mercenaries and sellswords that’ve cropped up since Edelguard’s demise, she’d bank on the latter.

Marianne meets her in the stables, preparing her a horse. “Professor?”

Byleth has to stop herself from pausing every time one of the Golden Deer address her so intimately. “Yes?” She finds it’s easier just to go on pretending like nothing’s wrong.

“Um…” Marianne strokes the mane of the mare gently, as if it’s a glass figurine and the gentlest touch will have it shatter. “Will you be alright?”

The faintest crease of a smile forms on Byleth’s lips. “I will.”

But she looks like she has more to say. Mulling, Marianne finally musters to move on: “Claude…he really loves you. And he’s holding back because he doesn’t…want to pressure you.” Her fingers grasp at the mare’s mane and a blush colors her cheeks pink. “I…don’t mean to burden you, but I feel like you should know.”

Again, Marianne, who is essentially a stranger, assumes a startling level of intimacy that stuns Byleth into silence.

“He’s enduring a lot for you.”

There’s nothing to say anymore -- there’s nothing she _can_ say without making a flimsy promise she can’t keep. “I should go,” Byleth whispers. “Goodbye, Marianne.”

Goodbye, Garreg Mach.

She looks at the spires of the castle where the light glows.

Goodbye, Claude.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> apologies for being late on this! was away on vacation, but i'm back baby 8) tysm for everyone who left a note of encouragement in the first chapter, please know i think the world of you all.


	3. home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For jullika! My claudeleth fever dream, my sun n moon, the bestest artist. I'm love u... this is my gift for u my queen

Claude always knew he’d never get the chance to marry the woman he loved.

Love was a convenience for the poor and a gamble for the rich with nothing to lose. It was for the careless, the desperate, the longing who shared an unspoken covenant: there would be no plans for the future. It was for men who tossed their honor for pride, women who were none-the-wiser, and those afflicted with stupidity and impulsiveness. Rich lords and ladies of the court who sought to leap through rings in a ladder to the higher echelon of status, and the poor who had pretty daughters to spare.

Love was for suckers…and peasants.

(He wonders if he tells himself this enough he’ll start believing it.)

Many of the graduates of the Golden Deer had started taking on wives and husbands after they departed the monastery.

Ignatz married a rich sponsor, a war widow he met while painting a mural on assignment. Marianne was married off to a distant cousin, as to keep the Edmund bloodline pure. Raphael married his childhood sweetheart from the village he hailed. Lysithea, for what it was worth, said she would sooner off herself than marry for stability.

“I’m living on borrowed time,” she’d told him, blithely. “It’d be foolish to waste my life on such frivolities, especially since House Cordelia has gold and resources to spare. We're one of the few houses that managed to profit after the war.” Then, the final nail in the coffin: “You should worry more about yourself, Claude.”

For the record, he'd debated taking on a wife in Fodlan during the war.

A countess from the kingdom who had ties to both the royal family and the empire: a young woman named Desdemone who was beautiful as she was sick.

Meanwhile, Seteth, for his part, decided it was time for Byleth to pledge her allegiance and settle down with a rich lord and sire children to groom as her successor when the time came. Though Byleth wasn’t necessarily surprised, she wasn’t necessarily pleased by the revelation either: she knew as the archbishop of Fodlan, she had certain duties to fulfill, obligations to follow, and expectations to live up to. She had to prepare for the future, however muddled it seemed on her plate.

“My father married for love,” Byleth told him, one day, and it was only then that the revelation came that many of the other men who fettered in and out her life did as well: Seteth, Hanneman, _and even Alois_.

They married for love because of, what, _carelessness?_ _Impulse? __Stupidity_?

"For love," she had told him, kindly, _patiently_, as if she had all the time in the world to spare for him. "And not a single day goes by do they regret it."

So Claude concocted a plan.

When the dust settled on their final battle, when the war that ravaged Fodlan finally came to an end, he would take her to the goddess tower with a proposition and a smile worth ten relics. _I think we can all agree we need a fair separation of church and state_, he’d tell her -- and maybe they’d laugh, share a few stories before continuing. _Once I leave for Almyra, I’ll need someone to tether the people’s loyalties. __Lady Desdemone has the love of the kingdom_ and _the empire_. _In many ways, it’s sort of like hitting two birds with one stone, eh?_

If Byleth asked any questions, he’d throw a joke here and there to ease the tension. _Don’t doubt my propensity in charming the ladies. I may not be Sylvain, but I’m quite popular among the nobility if you can imagine_. With that silver tongue, she’d never doubt him. She’d wish him well, offer him some prayer, and they’d go their separate ways.

Love was conditional, after all, something neither of them could ever afford given their positions.

But Byleth never liked following rules.

In fact, he'd go as far as to say she hated it.

*

The gargoyles are grinning, hunched in the shadows, covered in wyvern droppings. Claude feels his hands go cold as the night wind sifts through, bringing it a taste of winter and smoke.

It’s in the thick of night when she comes.

He's read countless tales of chivalrous knights who are seduced by the virginity of a single maiden in the moonlight pre-battle. He’d even spent a shameful number of nights pleasuring himself to them. _Stress relief, _he'd tell himself, and in the afterglow of shame and regret, he'd think of them as suckers and losers. It's too cliche, too overdone, and _way too cheesy_.

So when Byleth shows up at his room in the evening, he thinks _ah, she’s probably here to talk about our plans for tomorrow_. “Can I come in?” She asks.

“Sure.” He pulls the door open for her and she steps in, unsteady and hesitant, like it's the very first time she's seen it for her own eyes. "Are you alright, my friend? You seem tense."

Without any indication things are going wrong, she narrows her gaze at him. "Claude."

"Um, yes?"

She's fiddling with the hem of her shorts, shooting him looks like he might take off and leave any moment. "We might die tomorrow." Her voice is clipped and cool, almost matter-of-factly, and it takes a moment for him to digest _exactly what she means_.

He blinks, stroking the stubble on his chin. "Well, I'd like to think we have better chances than than just dying. But yes, you're right." He smiles at her, leaning back against his writing desk. "We might die tomorrow."

Now she’s looking at him in all the wrong ways, her fingers trembling as she reaches for the clasp of her cape. Before he can protest, she undoes it, the fabric curling in a heap around her ankles.

His smile immediately vanishes. "Byleth."

_Then her belt comes next, the boots --_ her hands are trembling again, _shaking_, and this is the first time Claude has ever seen her like this, this _hesitant, terrifying_ mess. "It's the only thing I know," she says, her voice softer than a whisper. "Everything else is uncertain."

He stops her before she can reach for the clasp of her shirt. "Listen, Byleth. You're not in the right headspace right now. Let's reconsider this in the morning, when our minds are clear." He gives her shoulders a squeeze. "You might regret this."

But Byleth's face sits in a perpetual state of impassiveness and she undoes the button of her shirt, her breasts naked before him. "I won't," she says, and for some reason, Claude actually believes it.

"Byleth." He can't stop saying her name, trying not to gape at her while his resolve slowly tapers away and the final vestiges of the fabric around her body fall apart, until she's stark naked in front of his bed. "You're...sure of this?"

"It's the only thing I know is true."

He throws away the last bit of his honor, leaning forward to break the distance between them, his lips crashing hard against hers, their teeth clinking before their tongues are swirling and rolling: it's wet, urgent, and pleading, and he picks her up by the waist to put her on his featherbed.

He feels a painful bulge in his pants as her fingers fumble with the strings of his sleeping shirt. He edges her onto her back, her head falling onto the papers and books splayed out, and he can't help but admire how _fucking beautiful _she is just laying there, doing absolutely nothing. Her eyes are heavy-lidded, filled with desire, anticipation, and impatience, and it takes him a moment to realize he's actually staring at her instead of touching her.

_Tonight is a night for remembering_, he thinks, enjoying the softness of her lips, the desperation of their tongues, and the yielding as she shifts underneath his weight.

"Dont," Byleth breathes into him, "Want to," _her hands wrapping around his shoulders_, "Think."

_About tomorrow._

Her legs part and she's rubbing herself against his thigh while his fingers meet her halfway, caressing the folds between her legs, only to find her sticky and wet already. "Don't want to think," she tells him again, and she arches her back and shudders when he slips his middle finger inside her, the sound sopping wet.

His thumb finds its place on the peak between her thighs and he starts coaxing her, rubbing different shapes until she's writhing and whispering _please, more, don't stop, Claude, please_. She wants to forget about tomorrow and Claude thinks he might never forget today. Everything is too quick, too desperate, too urgent.

He kisses her again, sliding a second finger in, pumping slow while rubbing soft circles against her peak. "I want you," he tells her, straining his neck to press a kiss against her cheek. "You're beautiful, you know that?"

"_Want you,_" she whimpers softly into his neck, sucking hard on skin until it's glowing red.

_It's the only thing I know to be true_.

He's lucky, he thinks, as he presses a string of kisses down her neck, to her breasts, giving her nipple an experimental suck and watching in morbid fascination as it hardens, pink with flush. _Only he gets to see her like this, so shameless, desperate, and needy -- if there are any_ gods, they've blessed him tenfold tonight.

She's muttering for him to go faster -- _"yes, please, just like that, more"_ \-- and the closer to the edge she comes, the more she arches her back, her hands reaching for his wrist and tugging him to go deeper, _deeper_\--

Her climax breaks over and he helps her ride it out. She doesn't say his name this time, but clings tightly to his shoulders, burying her face as she trembles and shakes until she's overstimulated, pushing him away, pushing him out, but still holding him close like she's got nothing to lose.

Claude wipes away the remains of her slick on her stomach before removing his belt, his erection almost painful as he sees her splayed out like this before him.

"Wait." She crawls to her knees, patting the empty space beside her. "I want to..."

He follows her demand, his hand stroking his erection as he takes a seat. Instantly, she climbs onto his lap, her hands finding their place on his shoulders as she settles down, his erection pressing against the inside of her thigh. "You...want me," she says, more a statement than a question, and when she meets his gaze, she _blushes_.

He tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear. "I do," he says, and she takes his erection in hand and slides down onto him.

Fuck.

All those stories and songs about sex could never do the real thing justice.

Claude digs his fingers into her waist, trying desperately not to thrust himself deeper because everything is _too overwhelming_, too good, _too wet_.

She rocks against him, and he's holding her back steady, letting out a relieved groan as she begins to quicken the pace. _Again, faster, hurry_, she brings him closer and closer to the edge.

"No tomorrows," he mutters, pressing his lips against her collarbone.

_Whatever comes, whatever road leads us to high heaven or hell, this is it_.

They rock together and his orgasm hits just as fast as the afterglow.

When she lifts herself off him, the remains of him trickle down between her legs, white and creamy against her thighs.

Still, she's looking at him all the wrong ways, crawling to her knees. "If tomorrow does come," she starts, her cheeks going pink. _She would blush right now_. "Let's do this again."

*

Maybe Claude’s a sucker now.

Maybe he’s always been one.

*

It takes Byleth three days to reach House Fraldarius.

The castle is in disarray: stone walls crumpled to ruin, banners torn from their holsters, gates thrashed in with battering rams, and farms burnt to ash. Byleth takes care to trek through quietly, taking stock of all the wandering gazes that come her way: orphans running in the street, peasants rummaging for leftovers lost in the rubble, and the stray cats that hiss her way, hungry and emaciated.

Felix is barking out orders at the gate -- _‘we should’ve had supplies come in yesterday, the hell is the alliance thinking?_’; ‘_there are vestiges of the empire in the south and we don’t have enough soldiers to lend Lord Manderly_’; _‘no, Sylvain’s not in charge here, I don’t care what he told you, my orders take precedence, he’s a damned freeloader’ _\-- and when he catches sight of Byleth, his face drops like he’s seen a ghost.

*

Byleth eats her fill in the kitchen quarters as Felix studies her by the pot of chicken stew brewing over the fire. She’s scarfing down her food so quick he has to wonder if she’s actually breathing, or if she’s actually a human rice bucket. He figures he has to start somewhere, so when she finally comes up to take a sip of sweet wine, he takes the chance.

“Why are you here again?"

“To see Dimitri.”

A snort. "What business do you have with him?"

She wipes away the remnants of stew from the corner of her lips. “I can’t visit an old student to check on his progress?”

Felix rolls his eyes. “I’m not an idiot. _I heard you lost your memory_. Hit your head too hard?” When Byleth doesn’t answer immediately, he goes on: “Sylvain told me everything.”

She lowers her gaze. “Where is he?”

“I asked him to go on a supply run two days ago. Seems he’s taking his sweet time, no doubt making himself comfortable with the southern lords. Seems like the alliance isn’t holding up their end of the bargain. Ought to talk Claude about that.”

Still, she's quiet.

She’s keeping her cards close. _Fine_. There’s not much Felix can do about that. She’s to take on the mantle of archbishop and as the archbishop she has resources far greater than his. There’s something to be said about peasants who don’t have two copper coins to spare who willingly throw their sad little fortunes at the church, but he won't waste any time overthinking the trivialities.

There’s little time to waste, what with the restoration of House Fraldarius and the vestiges of the kingdom looking his way for leadership, Felix has new responsibilities now.

Besides, Byleth has never been a woman of ulterior motives: that much is clear. With Claude around he might’ve assumed otherwise -- speaking of Claude, _where is he?_

“_Whatever_.” He nods towards the hall. “You want to see him that bad? Fine. Just be sure to mind your jaw.”

Byleth blinks, slurping down the remains of her stew before setting the platter down. “What do you mean?”

He opens the door to the kitchen. “Don’t let it fall.”

*

Byleth’s breath hitches.

Dimitri’s…_broken_. His body is utterly mangled, like a punching bag that’s been passed down through one too many schools, _one too many generations_. From head to toe, he’s wrapped in bandages, his arms crushed, his stomach gutted, and his left leg…gone, torn from the knee.

He'll never walk again.

“We found him downstream of Gronder, taken in by imperial sympathizers. More likely than not, he was tortured before he was left for dead. Seems like there's no ransom on the prince of a kingdom that's already fallen to shit."

She doesn’t recognize him at first, thinking this must be some sort of practical joke. But when she looks at Felix and that utter look of disdain on his face, she knows it’s real: _this is real now_. “He hasn’t woken up since we’ve found him,” he says.

She takes a seat at his bedside.

Felix lowers his gaze. “Who knows if he ever will?”

*

Claude ambles through the library of his Almyran palace leisurely, as if he has no care in the world, stopping short at the shelf at the farthest end, where the fire burns bright and moonlight is spilling onto the floor from the window.

Judith’s steps are clipped behind him. “Y’know, when you said Almyra lived in one long summer, I thought you meant it.” She gazes out the window at the snow gathered in clumps at the windowsill. “It’s colder here than it is in Fodlan.”

“Afraid the weather’s been unsteady,” Claude grins, taking a seat on the carpet before the fire, unfurling a scroll in his lap. “Hasn’t snowed in nearly twenty years. Perhaps your visit’s brought about a change of winds.”

“Perhaps so.” Judith’s smile is wry and cloying, as she follows suit, setting down a decanter of red wine and two glass cups on the carpet. “How long do you intend to keep yourself here?”

“As long as I need.” His eyes glaze over text and subtext, bored and tired. “Almyra has the resources Fodlan needs. Fodlan has gold, prestige, and gates that need opening. I’ll have to stay until tensions thaw between us. _Plans to make, things to do._ You know, the sort_."_

She laughs but it comes off as more of a bark while she pours full two glasses. “So, until you say otherwise. Could be the end of time for all we know.” She watches him move onto the next scroll before sliding him one of the glasses in offering. “And Byleth?”

He takes it, but doesn't drink. “What about her?”

“Please. You may play dumb with the others but you can’t fool me.” She sips slow on her liquor, tasting it on her tongue before swallowing. “You’re heartbroken, aren’t you? You ought to have a pint of ale with me and my men. They’ll be happy to have some new company around."

Now it’s Claude’s turn to laugh. “Your men find any man good company as long as they have a gold purse to pay for the ale."

Judith grins before downing the remaining contents of her cup.

Therein sits a fat pause between them as her gaze falls to the fire. "Kingdoms come and go: liberation, restoration, war. And just as war never lasts, peace never lasts either. We try our best to foster a new generation in a new world we often forget our own needs.” She lowers her gaze before pouring herself another glass of wine. “Sometimes we even put love on the backburner.”

At last, Claude, who's been studying his cup like it's a burden, takes a sip. 

Judith looks at him. “She lost her memory, but you haven't lost her for good until you give up.”

*

Byleth hugs herself, sitting on the stone steps of the castle with Felix’s cape covering her shoulders. Though the cold doesn’t bother her, she keeps the cape on for his sake, and his incessant nagging that he doesn’t need two people in his sickbay when he already has his hands full with one.

It’s a waiting game now, she thinks.

Dimitri will wake up; she’ll help him get better. _He has to get better_.

She’s not sure what she can do if he doesn’t.

Then, in the distance, he appears.

Sylvain.

He beams when he catches sight of her, slowing to a halt at the gates and handing the reins of his mare to the guard before taking off towards her. "Hey, professor," he grins. "Long time no see. You look..." He studies her, face gaunt and tired. "Well."

"Sylvain," she breathes his name in her exhalation. "You don't have to lie."

He laughs, "Aw, am I that obvious?" Sudden realization dawns on his face, as he reaches into his chest pocket. "Before I forget, you have a letter from Almyra. The guards passed it on from the gates. Said they'd never seen a carrier pigeon so fat before."

He hands over an envelope and she takes it, ripping it apart at the seams.

Inside she finds a flower crushed against parchment.

And though she can't explain it, though she knows nothing about it, though she doesn't recognize it, she knows almost immediately that this is a snapdragon.

*

Flowers had never suited Byleth well: she knew not of their names, their etymology, their stories, or their meanings -- she knew only that they were pretty things, _luxuries_ that provided only an aesthetic, no practical purpose. Lords and ladies opined them, bards sang songs of their virtues, but mercenaries could only admire them in passing before meeting their next mission.

“Teach, y’know snapdragons are symbols of deceit right?” Claude grins, holding the bouquet before him like it's some otherworldly treasure only he understands. “Is there something you're not telling me?"

She gapes, speechless, her eyes darting from the flowers to Claude’s face, then back to the flowers again. “I—sorry, I didn’t mean—” _By gods_, her words are crumbling quicker than they can come and Byleth is _actually stuttering_. “They were pretty – I thought they—”

She snatches the bouquet from his hands before she can finish her train of thought.

Claude blinks, but laughs. “I love them,” he tells her, reaching for them once more, gently. “On my honor, I swear.”

"You're lying."

"I said on my honor!"

Next thing she knows, she's clambering for the flowers, Claude's holding them high above her head like a bully, she tackles him hard, and he falls into the monastery pond with a loud _splash_. There's a lot of yelling, panicking, and laughing -- Byleth is apologizing profusely, wringing her hands, calling for help from the fishkeeper, who's nowhere to be found, and when Claude crawls back on dry land, soaked to the core, he's still holding the damned bouquet, all crumpled and droopy in his hands.

Still, Byleth is persistent, and when she reaches to snatch the flowers from him, he takes the chance to wrap one arm around her shoulder, holding the flowers out for them both to see. "Y'know. I think I've grown quite fond of these flowers," he says, humming, one eye closed like a diamond inspector. "What d'ya say, teach? Let me keep them. It's my birthday, after all."

At once, she lowers her hands to her sides, feeling his cape soak her back wet.

He winks at her. "Wouldn't mind getting flowers again next year, too."

*

Byleth blinks.

_Whose memory is this?_

"Hey, you OK there professor?" Sylvain has a look of absolute concern on his face, something strangely unlike him, as he studies her. "You haven't said anything for five minutes."

Byleth shakes her head, as if to shrug off that reverie. "Let's go, Sylvain. You must be weary from your journey." And then, with the last bit of strength she has left inside her. "We'll leave our conversation for the morning."

*

When Byleth is finally alone, she fumbles with the envelope until she finds a note tucked away inside.

_Byleth,_

_Perhaps I try in vain. Perhaps a better man would stow away his resolve. But I am no better man, and all I know is my own vanity. _

_Ha! Almost got you there, didn’t I?_

_Apologies, my friend, I wish I could see your face right now. Are you rolling your eyes? Laughing? Groaning in irritation? You always despised my dramatic monologuing, but I suppose your memories of that too are far gone. I wonder if you even know you despise it now, as you read this letter._

_How pitiable are we? Two silly journeymen searching for something, somewhere that’ll never come. Just today I looked in the mirror and saw a man I no longer recognized. I wonder too if you see the same woman when you look at yourself._

_There’s still so little I understand of this world, there's so much I want to learn, so much I want to see, but I suppose I ought to tell you that there's only been one thing I've never doubted. _

_When you were by my side, I was home_.

_You were my only truth._

_In perpetuity,_

_yours,_

_Claude_

_P.S., See you soon, my friend._


	4. beginnings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy holidays!! if you're still reading this... thank u and know that i appreciate u....

Byleth always erred on the quieter side.

She never spoke unless spoken to first, and when she did take initiative, it was usually worth something of value, which meant the room would go quiet in her wake. It was a unique gift and often gave the impression that she was perpetually sizing you up, even if that couldn’t be further from the truth.

For some time, Felix had been under the impression that she was just stupid -- sure, she claimed she was a mercenary, but with those ugly lace stockings, she looked like she’d just stepped out the red-light district.

Of course, underestimating someone he hardly knew was a folly tried, true, and old as time, but for a while, he was content with taking her at face value. After all, she hadn’t said a word when they met, just studied him like he was some pet project she’d consider taking under her wing -- _not that it mattered, anyway_, since Dimitri and Annette said enough to fill a whole auditorium with their ceaseless babbling.

In fact, Dimitri had been somewhat enamored with her at first sight – “she’s a worthy ally to have”; “I would treat any battalion soldier who possesses a similar level of value the same way, why do you ask?”; “we would be lucky to have her as a professor” -- the list of excuses were endless and _insufferable_ in equal measure and Felix had to bite down on his tongue to stop himself from asking if the crowned prince of Faerghus simply had a crush.

He'd never get the chance because days later, Felix would learn that Byleth had chosen the Golden Deer.

Disappointed as Dimitri was, he maintained a fairly sunny disposition -- _to no one’s great surprise_; the boar was decent at keeping a façade steady, even in dire straits -- and though Felix had half a mind to tell him _they would be fine without her_, that Hanneman would be a suitable replacement, something in his gut had been screaming otherwise.

_Something inside him was screaming -- _and Felix’s gut instincts were rarely, if ever wrong.

Still, life went on and Dimitri did as boys with crushes did—he spent his waking moments following the professor like a lost puppy dog, even as she spent more time with Claude after class, even as she found herself busy between Rhea’s missions, that brutal eagerness of his never dwindled. He adored her, and that crush inside him radiated brightly no matter how many times she brushed him off.

Inevitably, things would go wrong.

_Felix was right -- he was always right_.

Suddenly war was on the horizon, battles came and went, and the farther it went along, the farther Dimitri went. But, it was_ that day_ he saw him snap—

In the open plains of Garreg Mach, lives on the line against an army of imperial cunts, he saw a glint in Dimitri’s eye of irrevocable loss as Byleth fell into the chaos of war, never to be heard from or seen again.

He was never the same.

*

So as he watches Dimitri blink awake in the faint morning light, he has to wonder if this is for the best or if he’s better off sleeping himself into an early grave. _Still, despite all his misgivings_, he can't help but find some vestige of relief in seeing the crowned bastard alive and breathing. “Finally,” he mutters, meeting him at his bedside, arms crossed like he has better places to be, _better people to see_. “About time you woke up, boar.”

Dimitri blinks again, shifting his sights to Felix. He betrays nothing, that gaze empty and utterly devoid of any life. “Where…am I?”

“Under the generous roof of House Fraldarius.” Felix flops down to take a seat at the edge of the sleeping cot, yawning -- _because it’s been days since he’s gotten a wink of sleep_. Waiting in perpetuity gets old, _exhausting_. “How are you feeling?”

Dimitri grunts. _Well, that’s something_. At the least, he hasn’t lost his ability to form a response, however little and insignificant it is.

But like fate, footsteps come scrambling down the halls, and suddenly Byleth has emerged from the other side of the door, completely out of breath.

Dimitri takes one look at her and wrinkles his brows like he can't believe what he's looking at, _who he's looking at_. But the look of shock fades into something of contempt just as quickly while he shifts his gaze to some inconspicuous corner of the room. “Get out," he states, plainly, all too much like a commander doling out orders to some unsuspecting battalion army brat.

For the first time, Felix sees Byleth wince. “Dimitri—"

_“Didn’t you hear me?”_ Dimitri seethes, patience vanishing in an instant as he turns away. “**Get out!**”

Stunned into silence, she's still processing the shock of his rejection -- _perhaps not rejection, _but vile loathing. For a man who’s always prided himself on being prim and proper, he certainly has a nasty affectation when he tries.

Naturally, under the right circumstances, it’d be up to Sylvain to ease the tension, but seeing that he’s absent, Felix knows the responsibility will fall to him, _however annoying they may be_. “She came hundreds of miles to see you, boar,” he states _somewhat pitifully_ because even he can see how desperate and frightened she looks beneath all that indifference and coolness. “Ought to mind your manners.” _If there are any left in you_.

Dimitri falls silent, so Byleth takes a step closer and closer, like she’s testing the waters to see if he'll react, before stopping at his bedside. She looks like she has more to say, but the words cut themselves short in her mouth; as she reaches out to touch his hand, Felix suddenly feels very much like a third wheel on a date he never signed up for.

So as he stands to recuse himself from what should be a private moment, Dimitri shifts.

“Get out, Byleth,” he hisses, voice barely a whisper. “_I can’t stand the sight of you_.”

And there it is: that look in her face -- _something hurt_, _something fragile_, something irrevocably broken. Without saying much, she lets go of his hand, takes a step back, and turns around to leave, not without sparing one last glance at him because _he’s awake at last_ \-- she’s been waiting for this moment for what's felt like forever -- and now things will never be the same.

*

The Fraldarius training grounds are in shambles, but they make do with what they have.

_Ask no questions and receive no answers_.

Felix and Byleth share an unspoken covenant.

It’s pretty simple, since they both share common ground here -- his skills have rusted since the end of the war and Byleth has half a mind to _get her mind off_ Dimitri, Claude, and the snapdragon, and the memories that’ve gone wayward inside her.

They don’t exchange pleasantries when they spar, and _they don’t bring up what happened with Dimitri either_, until Byleth’s training sword comes splitting from her grasp for the third time in a row.

“Pay attention,” Felix snaps at her, more irritated than he intends because she’s not the only one around here who has too much on her plate. “You’re no good as a training partner if your mind is elsewhere.”

And he wonders, of course, just how much of her resolve had waned since her last encounter with the boar. Though she’d never taken the Blue Lions under her tutelage, her remarks about holding her weapon steady and true had been infamous. To see her training sword scattered like some dispensable treasure is…_unsettling_ at best.

She looks him in the eye when she bends down to pick up the practice sword. “Sorry."

“How disappointing,” he says, somewhat snippier this time around. “And here I thought you were all about putting in your best effort. Your hands not working?"

“These hands…” She stares at them, as if waiting for them to move on their own. “They’re not mine.”

_What the fuck does that even mean._

Felix is about to take his stance when a messenger from the castle grounds comes barging through the gates. “Wyverns in the sky, my lord,” he says. “We have visitors.”

*

The wyverns in the sky are looming, incessant shadows screeching against daylight.

Byleth feels her breath hitch, staring a the whole convoy of them—covered in armor and sparkling silvers and blues.

Among them, the largest wyvern of them all descends—and sitting atop the helm is one face too familiar.

Seteth.

*

“How long do you intend to stay here?”

Truth is, Byleth hadn’t even considered leaving House Fraldarius, not while Dimitri was still on his sickbed. But she’s not about to let him know. With his penchant for quelling jokes with nothing more than half a breath, she doesn’t have much space to work with, even if they are having tea and eating biscuits in the quiet of the dining room.

But still, Seteth is Seteth and he always beats her to the punch, no matter which life she’s living. “People are simple-minded and easily confused. I cannot act as an interim leader forever. Without a queen, _without a coronation for that matter_, they’ll be quick to think the empire may yet outlive our reformation. There are vestiges of Edelguard’s imperial forces lying in wake to strike, and when the opportunity presents itself, make no doubt they will.”

Byleth considers it, knowing what he says to be true. Even in this timeline, _even now_, the shadows are screaming -- she never had to think this far, not with her last life at least, but now it’s too late. She thinks about Dimitri, _about Claude_ and the snapdragons, and she knows instinctively that she’s been selfish. Pitifully so. She’s a ruler, and she has an entire nation to care for now; with Claude out of the picture, someone has to take on the mantle of leadership.

Seteth is right.

Whether or not this is real doesn’t matter. _This is her reality now_, and she’ll have to make do with it, lest it shatters and falls apart under her helm.

New responsibilities, new kingdoms -- she’ll learn this all at half-speed, even if it’s under Seteth’s cruel tutelage. So she meets his gaze and tells him _very well, I suppose this is for the best_, knowing that this is a decision born not of spontaneity, but obligation.

“We set out for Garreg Mach in the morning,” he says, sipping his tea. “And we must make haste.”

“Understood.”

*

“I need a favor.”

“Seems like that’s all anyone ever asks for these days,” Sylvain laments, grinning up from his breakfast stew. “How can I help, professor?”

Byleth hands him a letter. “Will you deliver this to Claude?”

He studies the letter, stamped and sealed, for only a moment before taking it. “You sure you can’t just find a wyvern messenger down by the docks?”

She doesn’t smile. “No, I want you to hold onto it. I have a feeling he’ll be here soon,” she tells him and for a moment, she can’t help but think about snapdragon and the memory that came hurtling back when she touched it. "Thanks Sylvain." As she turns to leave, he grabs her by the wrist, stopping her mid-step.

“Hey, slow down. I know you’re in a rush, but we still haven’t gotten a chance to catch up professor,” Sylvain chides, ushering her to the empty seat across from him. “C’mon, stay a while. Talk to me. I’m sure we have a lot to catch up on.”

Somewhat hesitantly, she considers it, inching towards the table at a snail’s pace until she drops down onto the seat before him. “So, uh... you're still foggy, aren't you, huh. You haven’t forgotten about me, have you professor?” When she doesn’t answer immediately, he grips his chest like he’s just been shot with an arrow. “That hurts, y’know.”

He hasn’t changed a bit. The familiarity makes her smile, albeit for a moment too short, before she realizes the futility of the situation. “You never change, Sylvain," she says and means it.

At this, he beams, eyes lighting up like he’s just been offered a free puppy. Leaning back into his seat, his stew all but forgotten, he smiles. “I believe it. See? Claude doesn’t have a single thing to worry about—it’s all coming back to you, right?”

She decides it’s best to keep things vague. “Some of it.” It’s not too far off from the truth, anyway, not with the snapdragons from the other night.

“That’s a relief.” He grins wide. “Claude was really worried about you. I mean, the guy was going to propose—we all thought you two were going to get married, have a bunch of babies, and live the rest of your lives quietly. Well, as quiet as someone like Claude can get. _No pressure_—I mean, I know it’s not all back, but soon right?”

Almost immediately, Sylvain knows he’s said something wrong because Byleth’s face is contorting with confusion and he clamps his mouth shut to stop himself from tumbling down a path he's already spiraling at full speed.

“Professor—it’s not back, is it? You still…don’t remember.”

She shakes her head.

Sylvain puts on the best smile he can manage and they share a breathy stretch of silence in the quiet of the dining room.

“Sometimes I wonder if I made a mistake. Leaving his royal highness, I mean. It was shortsighted and I did it on a whim, no thought to the kind of consequences that would follow. You were the pretty professor and I was young. And stupid. I thought that was enough,” he says, slowly, mulling over each word carefully as they escape him. “I mean, I guess what I'm trying to say is... man, _regretting _stuff really sucks, doesn’t it?”

Tears well up in her eyes and she looks up in dire hopes they'll dry up before he can notice. “It’s not too late," she tells him. "He's not all gone. He's...we... can help him. We can...save him from whatever is ailing him."

He looks at her, “Byleth—you don’t—” He stops himself short. “Are you trying to atone for something? Is it…because you feel guilty? Because you didn't choose him? It's not your fault, you should let yourself be happy—”

“—it’s not,” she states, shaking her head. “I…”

_I love him, even now, even like this_.

Sylvain reaches out and wipes away a tear from her cheek that she's missed. "Man, you're a confusing one, you know that? For a moment, you almost fooled me into thinking you're in love with him or something."

*

When night is darkest, Byleth returns to Dimitri’s room, shuffling around outside while waiting for some sign he’ll let her enter—_signs she’ll never get_ because he’ll never offer them.

This is not her Dimitri. This is not the Dimitri she knows.

And yet.

With time running short, she twists the knob the door before she can think twice -- to start _fast_ before she can taste the bitter tang of regret on her tongue.

The action takes more effort than she thinks, and by the time she has the door wide open, she finds herself out of breath, red in the face.

He hasn’t budged an inch: broken and bruised, he lies in bed, looking like he’s waiting for the death knell to take him. At the sound of her intrusion, he opens his eyes to look at her before looking away. “_Leave_,” he hisses.

But she doesn’t, instead, closing the door and making her way to his bedside.

“I told you to—”

“I wasn’t there for you,” she starts, nodding slow, _getting it_ because this is her reality now, even if it’s one that doesn’t quite belong to her – it’s hers, and all she can do is grasp it for what it’s worth. “I’m sorry. If I—” _If she could go back in time_, she’d…surely choose him, right? No, _not now_. Not like this. The words don’t spill because she’s afraid she might say something she’ll regret in retrospect. “I’m to set out with Seteth soon—matters to take care now that…”

_Edelguard’s dead_.

He must be thinking the same thing because he immediately tenses.

She takes his hand, only to have him whip it away. He shifts his gaze to the window, looking away from her, and that sad stump of the hand is all she can see now.

“What're you doing telling me this? You don’t owe me anything,” he states stiffly. “_Just go_.”

But she doesn’t move -- instead, she takes a seat on his cot, feeling her weight sink next to him. _It’s hard to imagine this is the man she once shared a bed with once upon a time_—a time that’s too far gone now. “I won’t give up on you,” she says. “I’ll be back, and when I am, we’ll…fix this. I promise.”

“Fix this? _Fix me? _Don’t make me laugh. You have no obligation tethering yourself—”

“—because I love you.”

Dimitri pauses, turning to meet her gaze—but that look in his eye is one of disbelief, _disgust_? “What are you saying?” He mutters, and he’s just short of laughing because everything she’s telling him is utterly, _utterly_ ridiculous. “You don’t even know me.”

That resolve in her eyes—it doesn’t waver. “I did.”

_I knew you, once upon a time_.

_You were a fighter and I was your right-hand_ _and though we’ve never met, I never stopped searching for you_.

Byleth smiles. “Will you take care of yourself?” She takes his hand again, hesitantly, and feels the tension in her neck relax when he doesn’t immediately wrangle away from her grasp. “I’ll be back soon to visit.”

He doesn’t answer her -- he can hardly look at her in this state, this pathetic shell of a man: broken and mangled beyond repair -- and when she lowers herself to press a kiss to his cheek, he feels the first beat of warmth in his chest he’s felt since he’s woke up.

*

“More wyverns in the sky, my lord.”

Desks never suited Felix, but he manages to scrounge up the energy to look up from his papers. “Seteth?”

“No—the colors are Almyran. Shall I send the pegasus knights?”

_Huh_. “No need. I know who it is.” Felix scoffs, noting with disdain, of course, that House Fraldarius was quickly turning into a goddamn inn for weary travelers.

*

“Dunno what to tell you, Claude. You _just_ missed her,” Sylvain yawns. “Seteth whisked her away to Garreg Mach in the morning to attend to urgent matters.”

Claude tries not to frown as he makes his way down the looming corridors. “That’s a shame. Suppose I should’ve written before I decided to ride out,” he muses aloud to no one in particular, stopping just short of the door at the end. "This it?"

“Indeed it is. His royal highness is in no mood to take visitors,” Sylvain tacks on, leaning against the cobbled walls. “Kicked out every handmaid in the castle, even the professor. Won’t see anyone except Felix.” That unrelenting, insistent smile of his finally cracks, as he shifts his gaze to the ground. “Doubt he’ll want to see you too.”

_Especially you_.

“I’m sure I can sing him a tune he’ll want to hear,” Claude says breezily, opening the door in one swift motion. “You’ll find that—"

The cot’s empty.

There’s no trace of Dimitri here, not even a whiff of him. Everything is prim, proper, and stowed away neatly: the blankets are folded, the pillows are stacked, and glass bottles of medicinal herbs at his bedside are organized, freshly dusted. Claude cocks his head to the side, studying the space and wondering if what they told him is true: could a monster really be bothered to take care of things like this?

Sylvain’s lip splits into a gape, “Shit.”

“Seems like your subject is gone.” Claude spares him a little smile, trying hard not to betray the great amount of _irritation_ hiding beneath this exterior of whimsy and politeness because _not only has he missed Byleth_, but he has a sinking feeling he knows exactly where Dimitri has gone. “Security must be pretty lax here if you can’t keep your eyes on the crowned prince of Faerghus. Ought to consider tightening it up around here.”

_Everything he says is veiled and goes way over Sylvain’s head_, but Sylvain doesn’t hear him -- he’s already scrambling down the halls, calling out to the guards at the gates in unintelligible orders that fly right off of Claude’s shoulders.

And Claude, of course—Claude’s left alone again. “What a shame,” he mutters quietly, staring at the spot on the cot that should’ve housed Dimitri’s lifeless body, wondering why he was suddenly feeling anxious about all this.

Footsteps come back down the hall and Sylvain shoves a crumpled up letter into Claude’s chest. “From Byleth,” he mutters, and before Claude can get a question in edgewise, Sylvain turns around and is _gone_.

*

Byleth always preferred horses to wyverns, and if the option was presented, walking to horses.

And yet she had chosen a work mare this time around, for the mountains of Faerghus were unforgiving to those who traveled on feet and because she had little choice in the matter, seeing that Seteth expected her back at Garreg Mach within the week. In fact, she had such little say in the matter, she hardly had time to pack -- not that she had much lying around in House Fraldarius anyway -- and even lesser time to offer her thanks and say goodbyes.

With a battalion of soldiers leading the way, she shrinks to the backline where it's quiet.

At least the grace of the wild offers her some warm respite, even as she feels a burgeoning soreness form between her legs from riding too long. The sun is beaming, the sky is blue, and there's not a single cloud to be found--

“Professor!”

She whips around to see Dimitri coming down the mountainside, just barely holding onto his mare. His hair is terribly unruly, his bad arm's sitting in a sloppily made sling, and he barely has his cape clasped on.

“Dimitri,” she breathes his name, feeling it tingle on her tongue as he comes closer and closer—until he’s standing before her, just reining his horse to a stop. “What’re you doing here? How—_how_—you should be in bed! You should be resting—”

“—I’m going with you,” he interjects. “To Garreg Mach.”

Byleth's about to giving him the reprimanding of the century, but he smiles -- _he's actually smiling_ \-- and suddenly she finds that resolve inside her fading fast.

*

Claude feeds his wyvern a carrot, _and it purrs gently_, as he untucks the crumpled letter from his pocket.

_Claude_,

_To preface this, I want to apologize—I can’t give you what you want, and though you’ve made your affections known, I can’t say with certainty that I return your feelings of want_. _It seems all I can do is hurt you these days, and though it’s not my intent, I can only tell you the truth and hope you accept my apology_.

_(I imagine you won’t be surprised to hear Seteth has come to take me to Garreg Mach. It seems I can’t escape his predilections, no matter what time I live in.)_

_Sincerely,_

_Byleth_

_P.S. Thank you for the snapdragon_. _I wish you well_.

Claude reads the letter once—twice, _three times_.

Disappointment begins to creep in slowly, not all at once. He'd never taken well to rejection and the third time hurts just as much as the first. As he crumples the letter in his hand, he pauses, eyes glazing over her words one last time before tossing it awa--

_P.S. Thank you for the snapdragon_. _I wish you well_.

Botany had never been Byleth's strong suit. She could hardly tell the difference between a petunia and a daisy, not that it mattered; she always considered them frivolous fancies meant for nobles and court ladies.

_But this_...

This means...

His breath hitches.

She _remembers_.


	5. rain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> first line is to honor witcher.. did anyone see henry cavill... cuz.... hey.... what's up.... :)
> 
> other than that, we are really reaching kdrama territory now!! hoo boy!!

“Wind’s howling.”

Byleth looks up at the sky, congested with gray and moisture. “It’s going to rain,” she says softly, looking Dimitri's way to see him lose interest _fast_. “Demonic beasts love rain," she tacks on, sounding somewhat _too _desperate to keep his attention reeled in. "Rhea told me that once."

"Is that so," he mutters, reining his horse to a full stop at the clearing, a remarkably difficult feat considering he has one hand to work with.

The Knights of Seiros have stopped to make camp, and a single squire breaks from the group to assist him off his horse. “I can handle it,” he grouses, voice low and weathered like he’s been offered a terrible offense on a silver platter.

Meekly, the squire backs off, not without keeping an eye out from a distance.

Byleth digests this all, as she dismounts her horse and hands over the reins to another squire. He’s struggling to unhinge his stump from the stirrup, and as she comes over, he mutters some incoherent profanities under his breath, which startles her because she’s never heard him mutter a single curse in his life, _not even when he was gravely wounded_.

“Let me help.” She tugs the stump out before he gets a chance to protest, and shockingly, he accepts her assistance, not without a bit of complaining first. As he dismounts the horse, she takes his hand—

\--and suddenly he’s toppling over.

Byleth barely catches his weight against her shoulders in time. He smells…like bitter herbs, _like the earth_, and that just barely begins to mask the punch of sourness from his hair. She knows, of course, that he probably hasn’t had a chance to wash up since they found him, and despite that, she finds her face going hot—he’s close, _too close_, and when he comes to find his footing, still leaning, she tries to look away.

“We should get you cleaned up,” she says, _clearing her throat just a little too loudly_. “There’s a river—"

She nods at one of the squires, but Dimitri grunts before she can call him over. “No. I’ll go myself.”

“Dimitri—”

“_I said I’ll go myself_,” he mutters, looking very much tired of this conversation. “I don’t need any help.”

Byleth frowns, that blush of innocence and joy melting into something of disgust and irritation at the very sight of him; _she’s had enough_. “_No,”_ she tells him _firmly. _“I’m going with you and that’s that.”

*

With the help of a squire, Byleth takes Dimitri to the river at the junction of the clearing, where the squire helps him remove his doublet, as well as his underclothes, until he’s stark naked.

To save his shame, she looks away when he helps lower him into the water, until he’s covered by foam and he’s leaning against bedrock to stay afloat from the water pressure upstream.

He thwarts any attempt from the squire to help scrub him down; all it takes is one push from Dimitri for him to go stumbling back.

_Splash!_

“Get away."

The squire backs off, soaked to the core as he starts flailing towards the water’s edge. Byleth comes to him, helps him to his feet, and dismisses him. _He's happy to be dismissed_, sparing one last look at Dimitri before running towards the camp like a scared little boy.

She kicks off her boots and wades into the water, _freezing cold_, a jolt of pain shooting up her spine. It takes what feels like a significant amount of time to get to him, and it’s only when her shadow touches his lap does he notice she’s even there—the rush of water whirling around them in the stillness of the wild.

He sniffs at her. “Have you come to—"

She doesn’t hesitate, taking a seat on a bedrock of stones and grabbing him by the scruff of his neck. Breath caught in his throat, Dimitri’s pulled down into her lap—staring up at her because, well, he has no choice but to look at her.

She starts massaging his scalp, letting the water run between them.

“You’re _filthy_,” she tells him, so gentle and sweet. “When was the last time you washed?”

He lowers his gaze. “I…I’ll admit it’s been…some time.” A pause comes, _thick and heavy_. “They didn’t let us bathe while we were captured.”

She runs her fingers through his hair, careful to tease out every knot and tangle as he allows himself the luxury of relaxing into her lap. _A band of mercenaries sympathetic to the empire who’d found him washed up after Gronder Field_. She looks at the stump where his hand—_where his leg_ should be. “They could’ve killed you,” she says. _He was lucky to leave with his life_ \-- there was no doubt about that.

He clenches his fist, raising his hand up high into the air, water splattering all over his face. “If I ever find them—I’ll kill them first.” And drops it back into the water with a splash.

She leans over, staring at him, and he finally opens his eyes to meet her gaze.

A blush kisses his cheeks, just as he realizes how close she is—_how her breath his hitting his mouth_, warm and caressingly moist.

She flicks him in the forehead, which makes him flinch. “Don’t be daft,” she snaps at him, wrinkling her brows—and in return his blush just darkens. “You’re in no state to take on any enemies. You were lucky to get off with your life, _with at least one hand and foot left attached_." She says it because it's the only thing she knows to be true. "The gods are unkind to those who tempt fate.”

Without any indication things are going wrong, Dimitri frowns. “You never spoke of the gods before.”

Something has stilled in the air; it’s as if Byleth has awakened in a room full of cracked glass, the soles of her feet covered in welts and blood that she's never noticed before.

“Were you the one who killed Edelgard?”

_According to Sylvain, it was Claude_. In her timeline, it had been Dimitri. So many answers swirling in her head—none of them true enough to admit aloud. “It was me,” she tells him.

He doesn’t say anything more, just closes his eyes and takes a breath.

*

Byleth helps Dimitri slip on his doublet, the last vestige of his clothing, and helps him to his feet.

Droplets of water slip from his hair, and he has a look of a god who’s just stepped out of some fountain of youth forevermore. Byleth finds herself staring a little too long, lowering her gaze to her hands, _the missing scar_, and wondering why it is she has to start all over like this. _The same man, but different_. How is that possible? How can one decision change so much?

Yet, some part of him feels familiar to her—so kindred and true. She saw it in the river—but it was gone before she could take it in. Appreciation is always lost in retrospect, she thinks, as she helps him towards camp, where she sees a wyvern stretching its wings out, _screeching_—

“Seems we have company,” Dimitri grumbles, stiffening even as he leans against her. He’s back to being crotchety ever since _Edelgard_ has been brought up, and Byleth learns she’ll have to make do with this later because there are bigger matters at hand.

Seemingly because Claude is at the center of their camp of knights—a roar of laughter in his wake. Byleth lowers Dimitri to a nearby tree stump. “Stay here,” she tells him _and hears him mumble something like being treated like a dog_ but she starts towards Claude at an alarming pace and the knights around her go deathly quiet when she catches his gaze at the center of camp.

“What’re you doing here?”

Claude grins. “Is that any way to be greeting an old friend?”

She blinks, not quite caring about the dozens of stares coming her way. “What’re you doing here?” She says again and that smile on Claude’s face melts into something of pain, _something of disappointment_—she knows because that’s a face too familiar to her these days.

He nods for the others to take their leave—and they do, _of course they do, even though they’re technically her men_. “Y’know, teach—wyverns are faster,” he says, taking a step closer, only for her to take a step back. “I could have you back at Garreg Mach by tonight if you want.”

Byleth glances over her shoulder at Dimitri, who’s sitting alone, _being ogled by the squires of the camp_. “No,” she tells him, firmly. She doesn’t elaborate, not that he expects her to because he immediately shrugs and _yawns_.

“Well, suit yourself. Just know my offer stands.”

“Claude.”

“Yes?”

Byleth doesn’t lower her gaze, _doesn’t take a breath_. “Why are you here?"

He smiles. It’s genuine. _Warm_. Claude is a man of many smiles—rarely do any of them ever reach his eyes. It’s unfathomable to think he’d spare one on her, _even as she stares at him like a stranger she’s never met before_.

“I came to win you back,” he says, and just as she’s ready to scoff at him -- after all, this is no knight’s tale, _no romantic song sung by a bard_ \-- she realizes he’s not joking. He’s being totally serious.

“Snapdragons.” He takes one step closer, but this time she doesn’t back away. “You remember them, don’t you?”

“I remember a lot of things,” she says—and it’s the truth.

“Ah, beating around the bush. How very vigilant of you.”

_Another step_—and now she can feel his breath kissing her face. “It’s alright. I ask a lot of questions I already know the answer to, but I gotta say, it would’ve been nice to hear you say yes for once.”

*

Claude makes himself at home with the knights while Byleth finds herself a secluded spot by the campfire with Dimitri. She’s peeling him pears, _feeding him medicine_, running through a comprehensive list of things she needs to do before she lets him rest for the night.

_Change his bandages, remove his sling, remove the stumps_.

He’s being uncharacteristically quiet—even now, _even _as he sits before her cleaned up and warm. He doesn’t seem to sense the tension, his eyes following Claude. “He offered to house me in Almyra." A pause. "He says their medics are some of the best.”

_He offers to house everyone in Almyra_, Byleth thinks, _and the worst part is he probably means it_ _too_.

Speak of the devil—Claude starts ambling over, along with his own party of knights who are eating right out of his hand. “_Teach_—need a hand?” He says, squatting before her, likely with no intention of helping at all. “Dimitri!” His eyes light up at the sight of the blonde at her side. “How are you feeling now? Any thoughts on my offer?"

Byleth drops the carved pears on a platter and leaves them on Dimitri’s lap, her fingers still sticky with juice. “I’m going hunting,” she states plainly, rising from her perch. “Alone.”

Claude smiles, patting his thighs as he stands up straight. “Fantastic. I’ll go with you.”

_What part of alone_ _don’t you understand_, she thinks, stifling the urge to sigh so loud she’ll make her displeasure known across all of Fodlan. Instead, meeting his gaze across the fire, she shakes her head. “No, I said I'll go myself."

Dimitri grabs her with his good hand. “_Professor_—it’ll rain soon.”

One of the knights cocks his head. “My lord is right. _My lady_—we’ll send a party of archers in the morning—"

Byleth shoots him a glare so dark he shuts up almost immediately.

“Well, how convenient! You’ll find that I’m quite good with a bow,” Claude states, spinning an arrow from his quiver between his fingers like some ridiculous showman at the traveling circus. “In fact, I’d say I’d probably have the leg up on you there, teach. Been a while since you’ve held a proper bow, huh.”

She gives him a look, _that look_, and doesn’t give him more than a _humph_, _which he takes as a yes because of course he does_ \-- he picks up his pace, jostling behind her like an overeager schoolkid with a crush on teacher, which isn’t too far off from the truth.

The knight sighs, taking Byleth’s empty space on the log. “What if they die?"

Another knight snorts. “Doubt it.” He picks at his teeth. “You’ve a master tactician and a master warrior working in tandem.” A moment of consideration passes, as he lower his gaze to the fire. “Even if they do die, the world moves on, as it was."

Dimitri frowns, watching Byleth vanish into the black alongside Claude, a wealth of distance between them as they take off into the woods together.

He pushes himself up from the ground.

*

It starts raining.

Still, Byleth trudges on, not quite sure what she’s looking for—_not quite sure if she wants what she’s looking for_. She trudges through mud that’s turning into _slush_ that’s turning into _sludge_ and suddenly each step is its own kind of battle.

It’s raining and Claude is barely keeping pace. He’s heavier, for one, which means he gets stuck _twice as much_ and it takes _four times more effort to get out_. He’s barely keeping track behind her, nearly out of breath as fat pellets of rain slap him across the face.

“Byleth—_Byleth!_”

But she keeps going, and now he’s stuck in the trap of following her in perpetuity. “_Byleth!”_

She doesn’t stop, not when she pushes a particularly stubborn brush out of the way, not when she rounds a fat tree. It’s only when she reaches a clearing that she whips around quickly, raising her blade. “_Claude,"_ she snaps. "_You have a lot of explaining to do--"_

But there's a shriek that pierces the air and cuts their conversation short.

A pair of red eyes emerge from the dark. “Demonic beast,” she mutters, turning her blade towards the source. “Where did it come from?”

Claude draws his arrow, squinting at the shadow rippling in the dark—_one shadow that melts into three, into six_—and suddenly, there are at least a dozen eyes staring back at them.

“Byleth, we have to run.”

*

They run.

Through the rain, through the muck they go, dodging tree trunks and sinkholes. At one point, Byleth gets her cape stuck on a branch and Claude has to rip it apart so they can keep going—_so they can keep trudging_ forward. She doesn’t even have time to snip at him with those awful, _terrible_ screeches following close from behind: not when he pushes her by the small of her back up a particularly jagged hill, not when he ushers her up the cliff, not when grabs her by the wrist and uses all his strength to get her onto the clearing of rocks above.

She collapses onto his chest, out of breath—_sloppily wet_—trying hard to roll off while getting back on her feet.

The screeches get more desperate, _strangled and hungry_ as they echo from below.

He helps her to her feet. “We have to go,” he says, and she takes his hand this time, following him straight into the mouth of a cave.

*

Now they’re stuck in a cave.

Byleth had only seen them in passing and assumed they were all inhabited by bears, _wolves_, and probably other demonic entities of the dark, _demonic entities that were now following her_.

Claude, who seems rather indifferent now, takes off towards the darkness first, exploring the endless vacuum until an echo rings out from the deep end.

“Seems like we have the place to ourselves,” he says, smiling as he saunters back like he doesn’t have a single care in the world, _as if they hadn’t just been chased by at least a dozen demonic beasts in the forest_. “What do you say? Should we start a fire?”

Byleth glances out the cave entrance, but she doesn’t need to see the rain to know just how bad it’s coming down. _It’s thumping like hail_, and the cave is dry, a warm respite -- there’s even some old branches, undoubtedly remnants left by other weary travelers of the past.

Besides, hell is waiting for them, and it’ll be some time before the sun can rise.

“Fine.” She concedes, gathering the remnants of firewood into a pile. She whispers a few words of the old gods, and there’s a spark—

Fire blooms from the brush, lighting a blaze in what was once an empty, cold, _cavernous_ cave.

Byleth looks up and sees Claude looking back at her.

He looks…_different_ with his hair relaxed, wisps sticking to his forehead. There’s a certain sheen to his skin now too -- she knows he’s wet, but with the blaze of flames between them, _he actually looks like he’s glowing_. Sure, she’s the goddess around these parts, but Claude…

She looks away when he starts stripping.

“What’re you doing?” She mutters, hugging her knees to her chest, feeling a chill run down her spin as droplets of water begin racing between her breasts, _down her back_, and across her face.

“Our clothes are wet,” he states, with no intention of stopping -- the surcoat comes off first, hitting the ground with a sopping wet _thwack_. “We’ll get sick if we stay in them for too long.” Next comes the doublet, _another wet thwack_ echoing down the cave. “We should dry ourselves by the fire.” And suddenly he’s done and he’s left in nothing but his smallclothes, his muscles rippling against fabric.

Oh.

_Oh._

Byleth starts by undoing the clasps of her cape, letting it fall to the floor in a slimey wet heap. “Surely you don’t expect me to walk around here in the nude,” she states, studying her shirt, _studying her shorts and her lace stockings_, the only vestiges of smallclothes left protecting her.

“Not unless you want to.” He winks at her (she doesn’t blush). “But no, our smallclothes will dry quickly by the fire. I suppose we ought to keep some civility around this neck of the woods, even if we are in a cave.”

Fair enough. After a moment of consideration, she undoes the buttons of her shorts and suddenly she’s in nothing but her stockings and shirt. _It’s cold now_, and the screeches from outside does little to alleviate her concerns, even if they are at least a mile above the beasts.

_And surely beasts can’t climb—can they?_

Slowly, she inches closer to the fire, feeling a prickle of warmth against her skin, _blazing hot_ but comforting. Her eyes are tired, stinging from the sparks, but she doesn’t move, doesn’t budge—doesn’t breathe.

“So…tell me more about this Dimitri from your time,” Claude starts, _that look in his eye like what’s the best way to approach this very awkward and strange conversation_. “He must’ve been…less scruffy, right?"

She glowers, but the question is enough to elicit those old fond memories of the past and she finds herself…_longing_.

He leans back on his hands, a soft _squish_ as his palms press against the floor of the cave. “Can I at least ask how the guy proposed?”

She looks at him.

Evidently, he’s not cajoling her. He’s being totally serious.

So she takes a breath.

She tells him about the knife, _the scar on her hand that's missing_, and the kitchen where he popped the question. Well, _not quite a question_, but not quite a demand either. _Marry me_—

Yes, marry me.

_(It was perfect.)_

Eventually, she trails off, staring into the blaze, feeling it tingle against her skin. She thinks about her Dimitri now and has a hard time imagining him saying the same words. “You were going to say yes to him, huh,” Claude states, matter-of-factly, nodding to himself as if he’s figured out some grand puzzle he’s been working on in his mind for years.

"Yes."

Claude reaches out a hand. For a moment, she thinks he might be offering her help again—but he notices her apprehension. “Let me wring out our clothes,” he interjects, and when Byleth doesn’t immediately respond, he sighs. He doesn’t budge, his hand outstretched like he has all the patience in the world. “Byleth.”

At the sound of her name, she perks up. Yes, he says her name quite often—_even more so when they’re being chased by beasts_—but it sounds a little different tonight, perhaps a bit softer. There’s no ease in it; he says it with care, like a precious jewel he's holding on his tongue.

She balls up her cape, as well as her shorts, and hands them over. Claude, for all intents and purposes, offers her a smile before taking off towards the cave entrance with all their clothing.

It's an oddly domestic sight, and some of it feels strange and familiar. So much so that she can't help but think about the snapdragon, the water, and the shrieking laughter that'd followed. _The inside joke only they understood_. She had been happy. That much is true. _He'd intended to propose to her once upon a time and now he was asking about someone else's proposal to her._

She looks at him, as he takes great care to squeeze every last drop of rain out of her cloak, and thinks about how much his face lit up when she'd gotten him snapdragons the year after--

The year after.

_Because there had been a second time._

_And a third._

Byleth holds her breath, the memory so foggy, so opaque -- as if it's sitting just on the tip, waiting to escape, _gone before she can grasp it fully._

The screeching outside is quieter now.

*

Claude returns, taking a seat next to her by the fire to dry off in his smallclothes. He’s…damp, and for what it’s worth, she can see the lining of his shoulders through his shirt, the way his muscles ripple, _the way the shadows look against his face_.

“Hey, uh—teach, you’re staring.”

_Shit_. Like a child caught on the brink of a tantrum, she averts her gaze to the dark end of the cave where there’s no light. “You had something on your face,” she lies, and _of course he doesn’t buy it—he wrote the book on excuses_. Instead he just smirks like he's caught her in a folly, which he has, technically.

“Did I now?”

She doesn’t answer.

_Don’t. Play. Along_.

This is just temporary. They’re stuck in a cave. They’re _stuck_ in this cave together. “It’s freezing,” she points out, hoping the change in subject is enough to warrant a change in conversation.

It’s the truth anyway.

There’s some shuffling where he is, and suddenly he makes his way over, wrapping his arms around her from behind.

“_Claude_—” But she doesn’t fight him, even as his two legs come around hers. He’s warm, _really warm_, and as the fire blazes on, she tenses in his hold, feeling his chest press up against her back. "Claude," she says again, this time with no resolve at all.

_Unwind_. Relax.

This is fine.

They’re stuck in this cave, _together. There's time before morning comes_.

“Claude.” She can't stop saying his name, shifting around, but his arms come around tighter, the scruff of his stubble tickling her shoulder as he leans in, breath hot against her skin. “We shouldn’t—”

“Just for a moment,” he whispers quietly. “Just one.”

She relents.

*

_How strange it is to start over with someone who should know every facet of his most shameful pleasures_, but he decides not to dwell on it as he pulls her closer.

_Just like starting over_, he thinks, _just like learning someone from the beginning_.

He decides, for now at least, he can surrender to her warmth.

He glances down to see her breathing, steady and quiet, in his arms.

She's asleep.

Or maybe she'll surrender first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank u to everyone who left a note of encouragement in the last chapter. i hope everyone is having a happy holiday! see you all in 2019! follow me @ wanderlu5tt if u wanna talk to me about ur OCs and shitpost together 8)


	6. standstill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t really have an excuse for being late on this except my interest in fe3h has waned quite a bit :(
> 
> This was initially going to span around 10+ chapters and I considered abandoning it altogether but I don’t want to leave anyone hanging so I’ll hasten the timeline so I can get an ending out—in the interest of completionism and such...

Byleth flings a rock into the darkness of the cave and listens for its echo until it ceases into silence.

Then she flings another.

And another.

Claude shifts his gaze from the mouth of the cave, the ceaseless pelting rain—that’s more or less stayed the course two days—to the very exasperated looking mercenary sitting before him by the pile of ash where the fire had burnt out.

“What’cha doin'?” He says, cupping his chin, studying her form: the way her arm winds up behind her head, the way her elbow juts out as she sends yet another rock sailing across the air and into the ether. He listens to it bounce off the wall before silence cloaks them once more.

She picks up another rock, bigger this time, and pushes herself up from the ground. “We’re.” Winds back her arm. “_Stuck_.” Sends it flying. “In.” As it crashes against the wall. “A.” And bounces to a silent standstill. “_Cave_.” And it goes on like that—until she runs out of gas, collapsing against the mouth of the cave, just short of the rainfall at the edge.

Claude smiles. "Yes, it would seem so."

"You're lax about this," she states plainly, too tired to be snippy. "How can you possibly be lax about this."

"I have a hunch," he replies.

She stops herself from snorting. "A hunch."

"Yes, a hunch," he says again, grinning. "Or intuition, if you will, that the rain will let up soon."

She betrays only the faintest bit of curiosity, but it vanishes faster than it can take root, "Hunches get you killed."

He blinks at her, that smile of his finally reaching his eyes as he looks away, "Yes. Yes they do. You taught me that at the academy," he says. "The day you went off on your own to the Red Canyon because--"

"--I had a hunch. I followed my intuition," she finishes, the smile on her lips wry. "I made mistakes and learned just as much as you back then."

They share a moment of silence, watching the downpour of rain together. Claude notices, of course, that there's a slow beat in his chest that wasn't quite there before -- _how silly_, he thinks, that something so trivial could make him blush like a schoolboy.

"What is it?" She asks. "You have that look on your face like you're scheming."

"Not quite," he says, eyes soft and tender as he examines the space between them, the unburnt fire, and the wetstone glimmering outside the cave. "It's just that...you remembered."

"Oh." Her gaze falls to her lap. "I guess I did."

He studies her, thinking about how small she'd felt in his arms. How warm she'd been. How quickly she'd fallen asleep. It was oddly domestic, living with her, even in these piss-poor conditions, and he often reminded himself that this was all temporary.

They can't stay here forever. They haven’t eaten in two days and the beasts below, emaciated as they are, lack no tenacity at all. Though they’ve stopped grousing, they’re no doubt waiting to pounce.

Had it been another time, he surely would’ve offered her some jest about taking one for the team, but she looks like she’s in no mood to humor him now. He wonders if he's said something wrong, if there's any bad blood between them he hasn't already cleared up, but nothing comes to mind.

“We could always start another campfire,” he offers somewhat optimistically. “Share old stories, pass the time—at least until the rain lets up.”

Byleth smiles. She’s been doing more of that lately, despite the added frustration of being stuck in, well, a _cave_.

Seems like he’s able to keep her spirits up, even now. Even like this. “You could tell me about that old proposal of yours again,” he suggests, trying best to grit through the pain. Suffice to say it wasn’t a story he much liked, but how could he overlook how happy it made her?

She fiddles with the hem of her glove and pats away the rogue droplets that've fallen to her shoulderguards before leaning back against the wall. “What proposal?”

He arches a brow. Waits for a punchline that never comes. Smirks. “OK. Very funny.”

She blinks at him, “What’s funny?”

He blinks back—as the slow realization that _holy shit she doesn’t know what he’s talking about at all _begins to dawn on him.

“You don’t…remember?” He says and that look on her face says it all: one of confusion—then, despair. Sadness. Melancholy. It’s like watching a fresh pastel painting get rained on. "We talked about it just two days ago. You..."

Silence.

"You really don't remember." Instinctively, he reaches out a hand. “Byleth—”

“Right.” Something in her eyes lights up and she clambers to her feet frantically like her robe's just been set on fire. “Right, the proposal.” Clutches at her chest like she has nothing else to hold onto. Fiddles with nothing but air between her fingers. She's antsy, completely unlike herself. “Right.”

Cautiously, Claude crawls to his feet.

He reaches out to touch her and stops just short when he realizes her eyes are resting on something in the faraway distance. “You can be real with me, By,” he says softly, keeping a respectful distance even though every nerve is screaming for him to hold her. “Did you forget?”

“I remember,” she mutters, never quite looking his way—and for whatever reason, he knows she’s gone.

Whatever bit of warmth they’d built up over the past two days in this cave, _alone_, had vanished.

“Dimitri proposed after I cut my hand. I remember.”

He wonders how much of it she believes.

Because there’s an uncertainty on her face that’s getting more and more opaque the more he stares at her. Like she’s running through a list of unknown options in her mind, snatching whatever memory she can like they’re running through a fast-expanding filter into the ether.

“But you didn’t one minute ago,” he says.

Something snaps.

Like a string that’s been stretched taut under the hot burning sun, _something actually snaps_. “I said I _remember_,” she seethes. “It’s not—I just—I didn’t know what you were referring to. That’s all."

“Byleth, c’mon—don’t bullshit me. The others might buy your whole sthick, but I know.”

She turns to face him, glaring, “Know _what?”_

“That you’re not fine. You’re not OK.”

“You don’t know _anything_—”

“Then tell me what happened after,” he interjects, grabbing her by the arm to stop her from shaking. “What did you do after he proposed?”

“I said yes—”

“Yes, and after?”

She racks her mind but trying recall what comes next with certainty is like trying to remember something that never happened. Like a word that’s too far out of reach, on the tip of her tongue, but gone like a leaf in the wind.

Which isn’t too far from the truth.

“Your memories,” he says. “They’re disappearing, aren’t they?”

There’s a cry below.

He peers over the mouth of the cave to study what’s happening, but there’s a cloak of fog that sits impenetrable.

“They’re moving,” Byleth replies stiffly, and only then does Claude catch a whiff of her.

There’s something about her smell, something so instinctively heady and wet. It takes him a moment to digest the fact that she smells like sex, _sex and rain_, but so much more than that she smells like familiarity. Like comfort and warmth, like something he knew _once upon a time_.

“Guess they saw an opportunity for a tactical retreat,” he quips nonchalantly, shifting his gaze to the pack of beasts that’ve gathered in the far distance where the forest begins. “Though I gotta wonder where they’re headed.”

Byleth stands, grabbing her sword from its perch by the now-defunct fire pit filled with ashes from a night before. “Something’s wrong,” she says pensively—like she’s hiding exactly how much she knows. “We have to follow them.”

Perhaps she thinks she’s better off pretending like this never happened.

“Follow them?” Claude has to stop himself short from scoffing because he _knows_ it’ll elicit nothing but a look of disgust. She's unreachable when she has her mind made up. “They nearly killed us and now you want to _follow _them?”

But when she doesn’t stop, he finds himself following her towards the mouth of the cave. “Care to explain your plan?”

She frowns, stepping towards the ledge of the cave to assess her options down the slope, covered in rain and moss. “I have a hunch.”

“And since when did you start following your hunches again? You always said to make an assessment before charging. Those who run in blind are fated to run straight into an early grave. That’s what you taught us back in the academy. That's what _you _learned yourself at that academy."

Byleth ignores him, testing a particularly jagged stone for safety before leaping down with her full weight. “Claude, as much as I’d like to argue semantics, I’m really not in the mood right now,” she states plainly—and he has to pause to digest how much it stings.

If she really cared, she would’ve put up a fight.

But she doesn’t.

And though part of him is hurt, the irrational part of him is screaming to stop her before she gets herself killed.

So he follows her down the ledge, sidestepping her pathway and taking the faster route down. “You’re not in the mood to discuss what’s apparently a very poorly considered battle plan,” he snaps -- he’s decided there’s no point in pleasantries when they were holding onto one another, nearly naked, two nights before. “Going off your gut instinct. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it teach?"

He doesn’t help her down the ledge and winces just an inch when she skids down onto her knees, just catching herself with her sword before collapsing. “I’m not asking you to come along,” she tells him, never quite meeting his gaze as she stalks right past him to take the next pathway down. “Go ahead and return to camp. Tell the others I’ll meet them at Garreg Mach when the time comes.”

Whatever semblance of reason Claude has immediately vanishes to dust. _“When the time comes_?” He echoes, utterly miffed because the Byleth he knows is not so boneheaded as to skip off merrily to her own potential demise. But then again this isn’t quite the Byleth he knows. “Do you even hear yourself?”

It must be the hunger (and not Dimitri), he thinks, as he scales the walls while the rain continues pelting them from above. A better climber through and through from his time in the slums -- it’s the only thing he can say with certainty that he has a foot over Byleth.

She never had to grapple with the weight of her own life -- never showed any inkling that she cared for it or considered it. Never had to climb from the darkness into the light. Never had to struggle.

Suddenly this has turned into a race of who-can-reach-bottom-first and she’s thrown all caution to the wind, barreling down the rocks with her sword catching whatever weight that slips while the rain continues pelting them from above.

And Claude finds his groove, catching up to her in a matter of seconds as he hits the ground with a _thump_, gathering himself while striding after her. “Byleth."

She whips around, “Claude, _I can't do this anymore_."

He stares at her.

The rain feels like needles sinking into every open pore in his body and dragging him silently to his own death. There's a lump in his throat he can't quite swallow, a wedge in his chest he can't quite shake.

“I’m not your Byleth,” she says softly; and as if there’s been some boulder sinking down on a patchwork quilt of stress and unrest, something inside her breaks—irrevocably. “Please, _leave me alone_.”

Claude watches her turn around and run.

He decides not to chase after her this time.

*

It feels all too familiar, as her feet sink into the mud, a ceaseless game of stop and pull.

The smell of demonic beasts looms heavy in the air, like a thick fog of shit and sweat, and as the trees begin to spread into an open clearing, she sees something familiar.

A sprig of royal blue among gray—

Dimitri looks so pitiful, what with the peg leg and that hook for a swordhand, the spear hanging loose in his grasp, and that silly eyepatch that’s hanging loose off his ear. He looks pitiful -- a fallen king, a warrior in the postwar -- clinging to whatever crumb of hope that life offers him and swallowing it whole like it's the only truth he knows.

But it was that same pitiful naivete that had captured Byleth once upon a time.

She can't quite say it ever relented its hold.

She draws her sword and holds her breath when she watches him catch himself with the butt-end of his spear as a demonic beast snaps at him.

“_Hey_!”

Every beast turns her way, staring at her with those menacing red eyes. She counts at least half a dozen, each one of them skinnier than the next. Nonetheless hungry -- and there's nothing quite as dangerous as a hungry beast.

_Shit. Maybe Claude was right._

She probably should’ve thought this through first.

Byleth never gets to catch her breath before tossing out her blade, each joint clinking wide, slamming shut, and jolting to a close. It’s instinctive, in a fit of rage undone, and before she gets a chance to process it, the bodies of at least four beasts fall sullen to the floor.

The others -- whining, _growling_ \-- are scared to take one step closer, but not bold enough to retaliate with an attack.

Somewhere behind them, Dimitri collapses to the ground in a heap as the others take off, tails between their legs, their cries carried away by the storm’s howl.

Byleth drops her sword and dashes towards him as the rain begins to let up from above.

As she clutches him in her lap, holding so tight, running her fingers through his hair, she exhales, a ghost of a smile forming on her lips when she feels him reaching for her hand.

“You idiot,” she tells him with absolutely no resolve. “Why did you do that?”

He grunts but can’t quite find the strength to answer her properly. “Y…_you said demonic beasts love rain_,” he manages to eke out. “I…”

It's instinct.

He had a hunch and he followed through.

But the last vestige of his voice escapes him as his eyelids begin to flutter shut. He looks exhausted, worn beyond his years, perhaps more so than when she found him. He came all this way—all this way for her, right? '

_I—I what? _

_I knew you’d be in trouble? I wanted to see you? I came for you? _I—

Byleth holds him close to her chest and breathes his name in every exhalation.

Only then does she notice the rain’s stopped.

*

By the time she returns to camp, Dimitri in tow, it’s sundown.

She notes with disdain, of course, that there’s a very familiar wyvern waiting for her in the distance—one that belongs not to Claude, but—

Seteth.

As one would probably expect, he looks peeved, if not a bit upset. Next to him is Claude, who’s still wearing that coy little smile—that smile that never quite reaches his eyes.

She averts her gaze, tugging Dimitri towards the far end of the camp where the empty cots are being rolled up.

A squire comes to relieve her from his weight—a heavy burden on her shoulder. “Tend to him,” she commands, and stops short from telling him to dress his wounds. Technically, Dimitri left the clearing of demonic beats unscathed and untouched. “Send for a mage to assess his status."

“Yes, my lady.”

She takes one last look at Dimitri before stalking down the grassy fields towards Seteth, who's decided to meet her halfway. “I rode out as soon as I received word,” he says—surprising her when he doesn’t sound like his usual snippy self. “You all had us gravely concerned. Vanishing without giving word. _Setting out alone without guardsmen._ You cannot afford to risk your life, lest you send this country barreling into chaos again. I implore you to return with me to Garreg Mach by air—"

“Seteth, I’m staying.”

A pause.

He starts massaging his temples, apparently finding it difficult to even look her in the eye properly, “Surely you must be joking.”

“I’m not,” she tells him, looking over at Dimitri. “You can take over as interim leader. _Claude_ can take over as interim leader. He’s here now, spritely as ever,” and the tone in her voice belies a wealth of bitterness she can’t hide. “You don’t need me.”

“On the contrary—"

She knows now, after all.

The farther away she is from him, the dimmer her memories grow.

“Seteth, I mean it.”

He pauses again, sighing.

She takes his silence as compliance, turning her heel and heading towards Dimitri’s tent.

“He’s dying.”

And halts.

“I’m sure there’s a more elegant way to tell you the news, but I’ve traveled something like 500 miles on wyvernback—and time is of the essence.”

Byleth chokes back a laugh because the idea is so absurd, _so ludicrous_, it’s like something out of a bad dream. “You...you must be joking."

Seteth lowers his gaze.

He's not smiling.

He's not joking.

**Author's Note:**

> Let’s talk about sexii ass Claude and dimitri @ [Twitter](%E2%80%9C)


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